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1/16
A Roman Sourcebook for the StageAuthor(s): A. M. G. LittleSource: American Journal of Archaeology, Vol. 60, No. 1 (Jan., 1956), pp. 27-33Published by: Archaeological Institute of AmericaStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/500085.
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2/16
o m a n
ourcebook
f o r
t h
t a g e
A.
M.
G. LITTLE
PLATES
20-27
EVER
ince Puchstein
and von Cube
first
drew
at-
tention
to
the
parallels
existing
between
certain
Fourth
Style
paintings
in
Pompeii
and the stone
scaenae
frontes
of the
Roman
theater,
there
has
been
general
agreement
that
at
least
during
the
final
period
of
Pompeian
decoration the
stage
ex-
ercised
a
strong
pull upon
the
imagination
of Ro-
man decorators.'
Some
scholars, however,
including
Bulle and
Fiechter,
Margarete
Bieber
and
Beyen,
antedate
con-
siderably
the influence
of
the
theater
within
Mau's
Pompeian styles.2
They
trace
it back to the
second
of these
and
see
already
in
certain vistas of this
perspective style
that
early
debt
to
the
stage
which
Vitruvius
ascribes to
Roman
painting.'
What
has been
lacking
for
the
proof
of the
theat-
rical
origin
of these
vistas
has
been
a
method,
first,
of
correlating
their
typical
but sectional effects
within
a uniform
and
developing
theatrical frame-
work
and,
secondly,
of
distinguishing
which
ele-
ments
in the
painting represent
scenography
and
which structure
upon
the
stage.
This
framework
and this criterion the
present
article
attempts
to
supply.
Once the
interrelationship
of framework
and
painting
has
been
established,
the Second
Style
emerges
in
its
true
colors,
first,
as an invaluable
sourcebook
for
the
stage
of its
own
period
and
of
others,
and
secondly,
as
an authentic
national
evolution
tailored
to suit
the
demands
of
Roman
taste.
I. THREE
TYPES
OF VISTA AND VITRUVIUS
Some
years
back
in
an
article in
the Art Bulletin
entitled
Scaenographia,
I isolated
and
classified
as
theatrical some
twenty-odd examples
of
vista
painting mostly
from
the
early
Second
Pompeian
Style.'
Although differing
in
scale,
the
vistas are
classifiable
into
three
groups according
to
content.
The
majority
are
largely
architectural,
affording
only partial
glimpses
into
palatial
inner
courts or
corridors.
Among
the
minority,
a
second
group,
part
architectural,
part
open-air
vistas,
feature
the
same kind
of
street
scene of two
adjoining
houses
with
a
garden
shrine between them.
Evidence
of
a
third
type,
unfortunately incomplete,
is
provided
by
two
matching
panels
of
conventionalized
land-
scape.
The
three
types,
moreover,
seem
to
substantiate
Vitruvius'
statement that the
painters
drew on
the
stock
forms of ancient
scenery.
The
architectural
fits his
description
of
the
tragic
setting;
the street
scenes
that
of
comedy;
the
landscapes
contain the
caves
and
fountains which
he
assigns
to the
satyric
background.
All three
forms
are united
behind
the
painted
pilasters
of a
small
bedroom
from Bos-
coreale
(pl.
20,
fig.
i)
and,
as
Beyen pointed
out,
the absence from
them
of
any
human
element,
un-
usual
in
ancient
art,
underscores
the
possibility
of
their
origin
in
the
backgrounds
of
the
stage.5Figure
2
illustrates
the
repetitive
nature of
their
content
in
a
variant association of
comic
and
tragic
types
on
a
wall
in
another
house;
figure
3,
the
contrast
with
two
more
usual
types
of
Second
Style
wall
sys-
tem.'
It
should be
noted
that
in
the
last
example
the
join
between
the
two
systems
was
masked
originally by
a
structural
element,
by
an
applied
1
The
relationship
between the Fourth
Pompeian Style
and
the
stage,
first indicated
by
Otto Puchstein
in
1895
at the
Win-
ckelmannsfest
in
Berlin,
was worked
out in
detail
by
G.
von
Cube
in
his doctoral
dissertation,
Die
r6mische Scaenae Frons
in
den
pompejanischen
Wandbildern
4
Stils,
Berlin
19o6.
The
most
recent
exponent
of
stage
influence at
least in the
last
Pom-
peian
style
is
the Director
of
the
Naples
Museum,
Amadeo
Maiuri,
Roman
Painting
(Geneva
1953),
49:
When
these
artists
(of
the Fourth
Style)
reverted to
the use
of
prospect
vistas,
their
work owed
its
inspiration
to
the
theater,
and
the
theater alone.
This statement
seems
to
imply
that the
original
vistas also
were
theatrical
n
origin.
2
H.
Bulle,
Untersuchungen
an
griechischen
Theatern,
Abh.
Bayer.
phil,-hist.
ki.
xxximI
(1928)
273-283;
E. R.
Fiechter,
Die
baugeschichtliche Entwickelung
des
antiken
Theaters
(Munich
1914)
43-45, I02-105;
M.
Bieber,
The
History of
the
Greek
and
Roman
Theater
(Princeton
1939)
249-252;
H.
G.
Beyen,
Die
pompejanische
Wanddekoration
om
zweiten
bis zum
vierten
Stil
I
(The
Hague
1938) 97-207,
352-359.
3
Vitr.,
De
arch.,
7.5.2.;
for
his
description
of
the
tragic,
comic
and
satyric
vista
types,
5.6.9.
4
A. M.
G.
Little,
ArtB
xviii
(1936)
407-418.
5
Beyen, op.cit.
I50,
fig.
56.
6
Fig.
2,
from
the
Oecus
of
the
Labyrinth
House,
is
from
my
article,
fig.
II;
fig.
3,
from
A.
Maiuri,
La
Villa
dei
Misteri
(Rome
1931) fig. 70.
The
gap
between
the two
systems
visible
in
fig. 3
is
not
the
only
evidence of structural
elements
being
combined with
painting
in
this
villa.
A
similar
join
is
found
in
the
small bedroom
(Room
4)
which
opens
off
the
room of the
Dionysiac
frescoes. In the
earliest
decorations of
the
atrium,
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3/16
28
A. M.
G.
LITTLE
[AJA
60
column
whose
grooves
are
still
traceable
on the
wall.
One characteristic
of
the
early style
is found in
each
of
these
figures.
This is
the use
of
sharply
slanting
perspective
lines to indicate the limits
of
a complete unit. Visible even within the brief sub-
divisions
of
fig. 3,
the
same method
is
used
in
fig.
2
to
mark
both the
end colonnades
of the
large-scale
tragic
framework and also the
limiting
sidewalls
of
the
smaller
comic
inset. It is used
again
on
the
short wall in
fig.
i.
There,
the
acute
angles
of
pergolas,
rocks,
and
fountains
reveal
the
presence
at each end of the
wall of
a
terminal
panel
of
the
satyric type.
2. THE
TRANSITION
FROM
FRAMED
PAINTED
PANELS
TO
PAINTED
BACKGROUND
Plate
21
(figs.
4-7)
serves
two
purposes.
The
first
is
to
contrast in
height, length,
and content
the
comic
and
tragic settings,
once
they
are redrawn
to the
same
scale and
reassembled
in their
frame-
works
side
by
side.
The other is to trace
in
the
tragic
type
the
evolution
of a
completely painted
background,
emancipated
from
its former frame
and
anticipating
in
painting
the
later
arrangement
of
the
stone scaenae
frons.
In
fig. 4
is
shown the shallow
framework of the
comic
setting
which
appears
to consist
of
two
end
pilasters
and of two columns
applied
to
pilasters
supporting
a
common
epistyle.
Between them are
enclosed
three
panels
of
painting,
producing
the
effect
of
a
street
scene
glimpsed
through
a
colon-
nade.
In
fig.
5
a related
framework
for the
tragic
set
consists
of
two
end
pilasters
and four
applied
col-
umns. It
encloses five
instead of
three
painted
pan-
els. The
columns of the
frame, moreover,
are taller
than those
of the
comic.
They
rest not
on
the
stage,
but on
plinths.
They support
not the
straight
line
of an epistyle resting directly on the columns but
on
outcropping
sections of
entablature,
between
which at
a
higher
level
than
in the comic are
visible
sections
of
recessed
panelling
indicative of
a
ceiling.
Within this
frame
are reassembled three distinct
forms of
architectural
vista.
The end colonnades are
taken from
pl.
20,
fig.
2;
the
adjoining
sections are
divided
by
their
columns
respectively
into three and
five
vertical
panels.
The
outer
pair
of
sections,
based
on a
prototype
in the
Villa
Item,
show
a
doorway
into
a
corridor flanked
by
small
panelled
rooms;
the central unit from the BoscorealeVilla, a door
leading
into
a
peristyle
court.7
In
fig.
6
(pl. 21)
the same scheme
is
executed
en-
tirely
in
painting.
Painted
columns
and
pilasters
re-
place
the
applied
ones
of
fig.
2,
and in
the
frieze
area are introduced
the
art
objects
and
Telamon
figures
found
in this
position
on the walls of Room
i i
of the
Villa
Item.8
Their
origin
will
be dealt with
below
in
discussing
the
relationship
of
this
type
of
setting
to the Hellenistic
thyroma
stage.
At the same
time, however,
it should be noted
that the total ef-
fect of both figs. 5 and 6 bears a strong resemblance
to that of the
columns in
the
stone scaena
of
the
Large
Theater at
Pompeii
(fig.
7).9
There
the
illu-
sion of
recession contained
in
the
paintings
is
re-
placed by
actual recession around
the
doors
and in
the
niches
for
statues
which
flank them.
3.
THE
EMERGENCE
OF
A
PROJECTING
STRUCTURAL
FRAMEWORK
So
far the
material used for
reconstruction has
been
drawn
from
the
early
Second
Style
and with
the
exception
of
the comic
setting
has been reas-
sembled from
unequal
sections of
varying
dimen-
sions. To test the
validity
of
the
method
comparison
must
now be made with
the more detailed
but
still
not
quite
complete
tragic
settings
of the
later
style
and with
demonstrablycomplete
examples
from
the
last two
periods
of
Pompeian
painting.
Four
such
comparable
paintings,
shown in
pl.
22,
figs.
8
and
9,
and
first
published
in
1953 by
Spin-
azzola,
are late
Second
Style
decorations
from
the
Cryptoporticus
in
the
Pompeian
New
Excavations,
rare
but
not
isolated evidence
from their
period. 0
The others (figs. io, ii) are respectivelyThird and
Fourth
Style
paintings
from the
houses
of
Lucretius
Fronto and
Pinarius
Cerialis.11
All
four
differ from
the
early
Second
Style
sec-
tions
in
two
respects-vertically
and
horizontally.
In
each,
an
upper
register
above the
columns
offers
structural elements
were also inset within a
framing
border of
painted
shields.
Maiuri,
op.cit.
197-199
describes
these
as
em-
blemata. It
is
equally
possible
that
they may
have
been
sections
of
structural
cornice.
7
For
the outer
sections,
Beyen, op.cit.,
fig.
19;
for
the central
unit,
fig.
22.
8
Beyen, op.cit., fig. 20 b and c.
9
Bieber,
op.cit.
336-339, fig. 440;
von
Cube,
op.cit.,
pl.
i.
10 V.
Spinazzola, Pompeii
alla Luce
degli
Scavi
Nuovi
di Via
dell'
Abbondanza I
(anni
1910-1923) (Rome
1953)
fig. 556
for
the
first
figure
of
pl.
22;
for
the
second
figure
of
pl.
22
Spinazzola's
Additional
pl. 7
in the
same
volume.
11
For the
Lucretius
Fronto
painting,
L.
Curtius,
Die Wand-
malerei
Pompejis
(Leipzig 1929) figs.
32-35;
for
the
Pinarius
Cerialis, Spinazzola, op.cit., pl. 38.
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4/16
1956]
A
ROMAN
SOURCEBOOK
FOR
THE
STAGE
29
a
new
element
of
height
not
so
clearly
marked
be-
fore;
at the
same time each encloses a
wider
expanse
from the
original
scheme.
Fig.
9
consists
of
seven
vertical
panels;
in
the
remainder,
the
outlines
of
the
whole
arrangement
can
be
recognized.
In fig. ii, moreover, a further distinction can be
noted. The
muralist has
differentiated
carefully
be-
tween
the
foreground
and
the
background
of
the
painting.
The
former
consists
of a
light
projecting
structural
framework
within
which
move the
fig-
ures of
the drama of
Iphigenia
in
Tauris;
in
the
rear
between the
openings
of
the
structure
can be
glimpsed
a
painted
architectural
setting
grouped
around
a
tholos
temple.
What
then was
the
evolu-
tion
behind
this
contrast
of
protrusive
foreground
structure
and
recessive
painted
background?
The simplest form of the new one-storiedframe-
work is
shown in
pl. 23,
fig.
12,
from whose
painted
background
project
at
the door
areas
pairs
of
plinth
columns
supporting
not
an
epistyle
frame but Tela-
mon
statues.
This
is
an
arrangement
which
fore-
shadows the
free-standing
porches
found in
a com-
plete
tragic
setting
from
a
Fourth
Style
wall in
the
Ara
Massima house
(fig. 15).
There
the area
between the
plinth
columns
has been
roofed over
and
supports
a
light superstructure
rom
which
are
suspended
terminal
curtains;
the
structural
nature
of
these
porches
is
emphasized
both
by
the human
figures
seen
entering
them and also
by
the
larger
than
life-size statues of
marine
deities which
flank
them.'2
In
fig.
13
are
explored
the
structural
possibilities
of
pl.
22,
fig. 9.
In
the
center of
the
stage
stand
out
two
pilasters
on
plinths.
These
support
winged
statue
figures
like
the
matching pair
aligned
with
them on
either
side
of
the
court
area.
The
projec-
tion of
this
central unit
should be
compared
with
that
of
figs.
Io
and ii
in
pl.
22.
Lastly
fig. 14
in
pl.
23 (based
on
pl.
22,
fig.
io)
shows the
application
of the projecting porch at each end of the stage.
Coupled
with the
protrusive
elements
of
the
center,
these
porches
complete
the
distribution
of the
new
type
of
framework
across
the
length
of
the
stage.
What
then was
the
relationship
of
the
evolution
just
traced
to the
realities,
first,
of
the
Hellenistic
and,
secondly,
of the
Roman
stage?
4.
PAINTING
AND THE HELLENISTIC
THYROMA
STAGE
The architectural
remains
and
inscriptions
of
the
Hellenistic
theater show that
about the
middle
of the third
century
B.c.
the
setting
of its drama
was
a flat wall
above
a
high
proskenion
stage.3
This
rearwall was
punctuated
by
openings
or
thyromata
of
graduated
width,
separated
in some
cases
by
fairly
wide stone
piers,
in others
by
narrow
pilas-
ters. The
inscriptions
mention
also
painted
panels,
useful both
acoustically
as
sounding
boards
and
probably visually
as
well,
to indicate
the locale
of
the
drama,
tragic,
comic or
satyric,
enacted
in
front
of them.
To restore
the
appearance
of such
a
stage,
the
authorities
cited above
drew
on
Pompeian
mosaics
and
paintings.
One method
was
to treat
the
thy-
roma as an alcove. Such a use is suggested by a
mosaic
of Dioskourides
representing
women
con-
sulting
a
soothsayer
in what looks
like
a
scene
from
a
comedy.4
Another mosaic
shows
the
empty
thyroma
during
a
rehearsal
or
a
satyr
play.
In
this
case the
side
pilasters
enclose
a
pair
of columns
sup-
porting
the
same
epistyle.
This is adorned
with
Telamon
figures
and
art
objects
similar
to
those
already
noted
on the
painted
walls
of the
Villa
Item
(pl.
21,
fig. 6).
Related treatments
of the
thyroma
are found
in
a group of Pompeian paintings quite distinct from
the Second
Style
sections treated
above.
This
group
comprises
a series
of
narrative
panels
found
in
the
center
of Third and Fourth
Style
walls.'
Their
mythological
content
is
frequently
drawn
from
sen-
timental
tragedy,
but their
present
relevance
lies
not in
this content
but in their
background.
This
background
generally
consists,
like
that of the
satyr
play
mosaic,
of a
pair
of
columns
between
pilasters,
but unlike
it,
enclosing
a
variety
of
fillings.
One
type
shows
the insertion
of screensand
occasionally
a central door
with
a
step;
another,
a
single
column
and
screens,
leaving
space
for a side
entrance;
in
a
third
type,
above
the
screens can be
seen
a
row
of
receding
columns;
in
yet
a
fourth,
the full
length
of the columns without
the
screens,
a
choice
which
suggests
three
methods of
filling
the
thyroma:
either
by
I)
movable
props, 2)
a
combination of
props
and
painting,
or
3)
painted
flats
alone.'7
12
For
the
details of
this
painting,
see
Curtius,
op.cit.
53-55,
figs.
30,
31.
The
complete
wall
including
the
right
terminal
vista
and
curtain is
reproduced
in
Anderson,
Photo
No.
26379.
13
Bieber,
op.cit.
206-257
on the
Hellenistic
theater
building.
14
Bieber,
op.cit.
249,
figs. 242
and
343.
15 Curtius, op.cit., fig. 26.
18For
the
Third
and
Fourth
Style
group, Fiechter,
op.cit.
45-49,
pls.
47-51;
Curtius,
op.cit.,
figs.
132-139.
17
For
type
I,
Curtius,
op.cit.,
fig.
137
(Paris
and
Helen);
for
type
2,
fig.
135
(Ulysses
and
Penelope);
for
type
3,
fig.
16
(the
background
of
the
Ixion
painting);
for
type
4,
G.
E.
Rizzo,
La Pittura
Ellenistico-romana
(Milan
1929)
pl.
36
(the
infant
Hercules strangling the
sna~kes).
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30
A. M.
G.
LITTLE
[AJA
60
Thus
the
thyroma,
whether
empty
or
filled,
offered
quite
a
range
of structural
or
painted
possibilities
as
a
dramatic
background.
The
growth
of
painting,
however,
may
well have
been
gradual
upon
such
a
stage,
since
it was
de-
pendent on two factors, one of which tended to
limit
its
use,
while
the other
encouraged
it. The
limiting
factor was the
predominantly
architectural
type
of
setting
required
for
most
Greek
plays
among
which
only
the
satyr
drama
and
certain
outdoor locales
in
tragedy
called for the
painted
suggestion
of
landscape.
The
encouraging
factor
was the
need
to
suggest
even on a small
stage
the
spacious
atmosphere
of the
tragic royal palace.
As
we shall
see,
this could have
been
done
simply
enough
on a
large stage by
the use of
props
alone;
on a smaller stage it was made easierby the decep-
tive
recession
of
perspective
painting
which
ac-
complished
the
same
effect within a smaller
area.
Plate
24
will
illustrate
the
comparative
values
of these
two methods on
three
representative
Hel-
lenistic
stages
drawn
to the same
scale: at
Ephe-
sus
(pl. 24, figs.
i6
and
18),
one
of
the
largest
and
earliest
(ca.
250
B.c.);
at
Oropus
(pl.
24, fig.
21),
in
a diminutive
setting
(200-150
B.c.);
and
at
Ere-
tria
(pl. 24, fig. 22),
whose last form of
medium-
sized
stage
is
dated
by
Fiechter
about 200
B.c. 8
Fig.
16
on
pl. 24
represents
the
Ephesian
stage
set with
props
as the facade of a
palace.
It is a
modification of a
restoration
by
Fiechter. 9
In
the
present
diagram
the
three
doors
are
centered in
mid-stage,
and a
variant
form of
prop setting
is
substituted in the
adjoining
thyromata.
This con-
sists of
a
single
column and screen which leaves
a
passageway
to
a rear door found at this
point
at
Ephesus
and
so
represented
also in the
Pompeian
paintings.
The resultant
total
effect
is
quite
similar
to that of the
facade
of
the
House
of the
Faun
(fig. 17),
itself
a
contemporary
Hellenistic
palace
in a small rural
town.20
The same facade suggests
also
how
easily
a set for
comedy
could
have
been
arranged
to
represent
adjoining
houses
and
shops.
Conversely,
by
the use of
hangings
as
shown
in the
Pompeian
paintings,
an interior scene for
tragedy
could have been achieved with
equal
ease
(fig.
18).
For the use of curtains at
these
points, compare
pl.
22,
fig.
I1.21
But
if
on
a
large
stage
like that
at
Ephesus,
the
use
of
props
sufficed
to
suggest
the
realities
of the
Hellenistic
palace,
the
figures,
19
and 20
(pl.
24),
demonstrate
the
advantages
of
painting
on
a
smal-
ler
stage. Fig. 19
shows the
empty
thyroma
frame-
work of the satyr play mosaic; fig.
20,
the large
vista
prospect
in
the
Tablinum
of the
House
of the
Faun as viewed
above the screens
which
gave
this
area of the
Roman
house its
name.
On the
Oropus
and
Eretria
stages
(figs.
21
and
22)
a similar
ef-
fect
was made
possible
in the smaller
dimensions
of
perspective
painting
simply
by repeating
the
re-
ceding
lines of
a colonnade
in the
center
and
at
the
ends of
a row
of
painted
panels
inset between
pilasters.
For
a
comic
setting
achieved
on a
triple
thyroma
stage by
the
same
method,
compare
pl.
21,
fig. 4.
5.
STAGE
AINTING
NDROMAN
RCHITECTURE
At
Rome the
brief
flowering
period
of
scenog-
raphy
probably
did not
long
outlast
the
first
cen-
tury
B.c.,
since
it was
closely
associated
with a
pass-
ing
phenomenon
of Roman
society,
the
temporary
festival
stage.
Under
the
Republic
this was
the
only type
permitted
by
the
Senate. Such
buildings
were erected
for
special
occasions
like
triumphal
games
and were
then
promptly
dismantled.
Three
dates
in this
century
are
significant
for
the rise,
expansion,
and
incipient
decline of Roman
scenography.22
According
to
the elder
Pliny,
it was
in
99
B.c.,
just
a
century
after the
stage
background
at Eretria
had taken
final
painted
shape,
that
Clau-
dius
Pulcher
introduced
realistic
architectural cene-
painting
as
a
novelty
to
the
capital.
About a
quarter
of
a
century
later,
the
entire
stage
wall of the small
theater
at
Pompeii
(the
earliest stone
Roman theater
still
extant)
was
decorated
with
Second
Style
paint-
ings.
In
55
B.c.
work
was
started
on
Pompey's
thea-
ter,
the first
at Rome
in
a
developing
line
of
stone
scaenae whose rise spelled the ultimate displace-
ment of
the
painted
background.
Although
the erec-
tion
of wooden
stages
continued in
imperial
times,
the
inscriptional
evidence
shows
that
they
could be
the
experimental
forerunners
of stone construction
on the
same site.23
Andreas
Rumpf,
therefore,
is
probably
correct
in
distinguishing
two
periods
of
innovation in the
18
For the
dating
of
the
Ephesus
and
Oropos
theaters,Bieber,
op.cit.
228
and
235;
for
that
of the
final form
of
the
theater
at
Eretria, Fiechter,
Das
Theater
in
Eretria
(Stuttgart 1937) 41.
19
Fiechter,
op.cit.
note
2,
fig.
65.
20
A. Mau, Pompei, its Life and Art (New York
I904),
fig.
139.
21
For the
use of
curtains in an interior
scene,
Curtius,
op.cit.,
fig. 124
(Achilles
in
Scyros), fig. 134
(Thetis
and
Hephaestus).
22
Bieber,
op.cit.
326-355
on the
development
of
the Roman
theater
building.
23
CIL XIII, 1642, Dessau 5639, Claudian period.
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6/16
1956]
A ROMAN
SOURCEBOOK
FOR THE
STAGE
31
evolving
Roman scaenae
frons:
the
first
(noted by
Pliny) during
which Hellenistic
scenography
re-
ceived
its
ultimate extension
upon
the
Roman
festival
stages,
and a
second
(which Pliny
took
for
granted) during
which such
painted
effects were
converted into structural forms.24 It should be
added that
this
may
well
have
been a
gradual
process
begun
on the
temporary
stages
in
painting
and
expressed
in
permanent
form
on the
stone.
One
reason for an
early
changeover
seems
implicit
in
the
double
function
of
the
Roman
festival
stage
which
served
not
only
as a
domestic
background
but
also
probably
as a
triumphal
showcase
for the
loot
of
successful
campaigns,
namely,
statues
and
other
art
objects.
As
we have
seen
above,
Rumpf's
thesis
receives
support
from
the
record of
Roman
painting,
for
if
the earlier
Second
Style
theatrical
motifs seem
closely
allied
to the
Hellenistic
thyroma
settings,
the later
examples
even in
the same
style
seem
al-
ready
to reflect
the formation of
a
new and
more
typically
Roman structural
background.
Thus
four
stages
in
this
transition can be
traced
in
the
paint-
ing:
i)
the
use of
Hellenistic
scenography
within
the
thyroma
framework of the
comic
setting,
and
in
modified form in
the
tragic
(pl.
21,
figs.
4
and
5);
2)
a
hypothetical
stage,
when both
scenery
and
framework
were
united in one
continuous
painted
background (fig. 6 of the same plate); 3) the
emergence
shown in
the
figures
of
plates
22
and
23
of
a
new
form
of
freestanding
framework
in
front
of
the
painted
background;
and
finally
4)
the
conversion
of this
framework
into
permanent
stone
form with
the
consequent
loss of the
painted
elements,
a
period
best
illustrated
in
von
Cube's
examples
from
the
Fourth
Pompeian
Style.
His-
torically
the
first two
stages represent
the
logical
outcome
of the
Hellenistic
tradition
on
the Italian
stage,
namely,
the
expansion
of
painting
at
the
expense of structure, while the last two represent
the rise
of
a
new
Roman
tradition in
which
struc-
ture
finally
triumphs
at
the
expense
of
painting.
Catalyst
in this
process
was that
truly experimental
Roman
theatrical
form,
the
festival
stage.
What
then
are the
peculiarly
national
elements
traceable in
this evolution
as
reflected
in
Roman
painting? Perhaps
the clearest of these
are to
be
found
in three features
of the
tragic
setting,
namely,
I)
the individual
projecting
columns
supported
on
plinths
and
supporting outcropping
sections
of
en-
tablature,
2)
the
pairs
of columns
resting
not
on
the ground but on a podium and 3) the use of
the arch. These three
features are
all characteristic
not of Hellenistic
but
of
Roman
architecture,
and
the first
two served
a
special
purpose
on
the
low
Roman
stage
inherited
from the
Phlyakes.
They
gave
additional
height
to the
columns,
which
if
ar-
ranged
in
pairs
provided
also a convenient
frame
for
a statue or art
object.
This
conjunction
of
podi-
um
support
and
projecting
sectional framework
is
not
only
found
throughout
the Second
Style
tragic
sections,
but left its mark
also on the
development
of
typically
Roman
architectural
forms.
The connection
between
the Second
Style
and
later Roman architecture
is
illustrated
in
plates
25-
27,
where are reassembled
five
of the
original
stage
models
serving
the Second
Style
painters.
Arranged
in the
chronological
order
of their
appearance
in
the
style,
they
serve both
to
recapitulate
the
chang-
ing relationship
of
structure
and
painting
during
that
period
of decoration
and also
the evolution
of
a formal structural
pattern
which left an
indelible
mark both
on Roman
painting
and
on
Roman
architecture
as
well.
P1.
25,
figs.
23
and
24, represent
fully painted
walls.
In
fig.
23
the
three central
panels
are
taken
from
a
miniature
painting
in
the
Villa
Item.25
The
side
panels
of the central
unit with their
half
pediments
are
restored
to match the
vista
at the
other
end of the court seen
in the
original
above
the door. This
again
is
an
arrangement
more
typi-
cal
of
Roman than of
Hellenistic
architecture and
is found
at a
later
date
in
the
upper
register
of
the
Roman market
gate
at
Miletus
(fig.
25)-.6
Fig.
24
is built
up
around
another central
unit found
in
a
small room of the Labyrinth House at Pompeii
and
parallels
the
lower
register
of the
same
gate-
way.27
In similar
manner
the
restoration
of the
tholos shrine
setting
of
pl.
26,
fig.
26
and of
the
propylon
set
from
the Boscoreale
Villa
(fig.
27)
recalls
the
upper
and lower
registers
of
the
Khazne
at Petra
(fig. 28).28
Finally,
the
central
unit
in
the
24
A.
Rumpf,
Mdl
III
(1950)
40-50.
25
Maiuri,
op.cit.,
fig.
72
(Room
16).
Herms
are
found
in
a
similar
position
in
a
room in
the
House
of
Popidius
Priscus
illustrated in
my
article, ArtB
xvii
(1936)
412, fig.
6.
26Fig.
25
is
taken from
H.
Th.
Bossert
and
W.
Zschietzsch-
mann,
Hellas
and Rome
(London
I936),
pl.
95.
27Beyen, op.cit.,
fig.
95.
The whole wall is treated in
my
article,
The
Decoration
of the
Hellenistic
Peristyle
House
in
South
Italy,
AJA
xxxix
(I935)
370 fig.
23.
The
protrusive
statues
of the
Tritons in
the
original
have
been
set
back
within
the framework
of the
restored
setting.
28
For
fig.
26
compare
pi.
20,
fig.
I;
Beyen,
op.cit.,
fig. 94
(a
variant in
the
House
of the
Labyrinth);
also
fig. Ioo (Villaof
Julia
Felix).
Fig.
28
of
pl.
26 is taken
from
Bossert
and
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32
A. M.
G.
LITTLE
[AlA
60
almost
complete
setting
of
pl.
27,
fig. 29
from
the
House of Obellius Firmus
recalls
the columnar
grouping
of
the
Roman
triumphal
arch
(fig.
30).29
One feature which in itself underlines
the transi-
tion from
painted
to
structural
forms
on the
Roman
stage
is
noteworthy
in the
development
of these
settings.
This
is
the
treatment of the
painting
in
the central area of
the
stage.
In
the
early
painted
settings (pl.
25, figs. 23
and
24)
this area
is
marked
by
a
recession;
in the other
examples
shown in
pl.
26,
figs.
26 and
27,
and
pl.
27,
fig.
29,
which feature
projecting
columns
on either side
of
the
flanking
doors,
the
painting
of
the
central
area is
marked
by
similar
protrusive
elements
which
match
these
projections.
As
can be
seen
in
pl.
27,
fig.
3I,
it
was the
grow-
ing structural element on the stage and not the
vista which
impressed
the
Third
Style
painter.
In
this
outline
diagram,
based on a wall
in the house
of
Spurius
Mesor and
typical
of other
friezes in
the
same
style,
it is
the
structural features which
he
preserves. 3
This is
a
transition visible
also
in
pl.
21,
fig.
6,
where
the
painter
has omitted all
but the
structural
features of
the
stage setting.
6.
CONCLUSION:
THE
CONTRIBUTION OF
THE STAGE TO
ROMAN
PAINTING
A concluding note on the contribution of the
stage
to each of
the three
forms of
pictorial
Pom-
peian
decoration is
perhaps
in
order. In this
painted
development,
the
theatrical
influence was at its
clearest
and
most creative
in the Second
Style,
was
temporarily
retired,
although
not obliterated
by
the ornamental
content of the
Third,
and
returned
as
one
among
several
major
influences in
the
Fourth. The
reason for this
fluctuation,
however,
must
be
sought
in the broader context
of
a de-
veloping
national
art,
in the slow transition from a
Greek tradition of architectural decoration to a
pictorial
Roman form more
in
keeping
with
Italian
taste.
Viewed
in this
light,
the
Second
Pompeian
or
Scenographic Style
is not
only
the first
pictorial
form of decoration in that
city
but is
probably
also
the first
authentically
Roman contribution
to
wall
painting.
Mau termed the new
form
the Architec-
tural
Style,
thus
stressing
its connection with its
Hellenistic
predecessor,
the
plastic
First
Style;
he
did
not,
however,
realize
fully
that the
new medium
brought
with
it the seeds
of
destruction
for the old
structural
Greek
concept.
The first move in
that
direction
was
the use
of
perspective
or
scenography,
as both Greeks and Romans termed this technique
of
painting;
the
second was the
application
of
the
actual
content
of
stage
scenery;
with the
progres-
sive
adaptation
of each
standard Hellenistic
form,
first
tragic,
then
comic,
finally
satyric,
a
correspond-
ingly
larger
area
of the
structuralwall
pattern
dis-
solved.
This
evolution, however,
alone
is not sufficient
to
stamp
the
resultant
style
as
Roman. Two other
factors must
be
stressed,
namely,
i)
the
archi-
tectural
atmosphere
which
created
it,
and
2)
the
experimental architectural orms represented n the
painting,
which have
already
been
pointed
out.
The
first factor was the
product
of Roman
invention,
and its creators
were not Hellenistic
Greeks,
but
Roman architects
and
engineers,
whose
experiments
with the concrete
vaulting
of arches ushered
in a
new
era in wall decoration.
Vaulting
appreciably
contracted the
cubic
space
of the
living quarters
and demanded
compensation
first in
expanding
the
spatial
illusion
of
the
painted
structural
pattern
and
finally
in
breaking
it down
entirely.
With the destruction of the old pattern, the
course
was
thus set for the
emergence
in the
Third
Style
of
a
new,
less
confining,
more
truly
pictorial
wall
surface,
in
which
ornamental
detail
served
as
a framework
no
longer
for
a theatrical
vista
but
for the central
ornament
of
the
wall,
a
mythological
painting,
frequently
with a
landscape background.
This trend
in its
turn
yielded
place
to
a
new
style,
Mau's
Fourth,
which
incorporated
together
orna-
ment,
central
painting,
and
once
more,
but
largely
as
a decorative
feature,
the
perspective
play
of
theatrical vista.
Thus took
shape
in
Roman
painting
a
peculiarly
national
evolution
upon
which
the theater
at each
period
set its
stamp, corresponding
not
by
accident
to actual
changes
in
the nature
of the Roman
stage.
During
the
Second
Style,
the wall
reflected the
hey-
day
of
scene-painting
and its
vistas on the
temporary
festival
stage;
during
the
Third,
the
temporary
suppression
of
vista marked the transition
to
a
Zschietzschmann,
op.cit.,
pl.
169.
For
fig.
27,
F.
Barnabei,
La
Villa
Pompeiana
di
P.
Fannio
Sinistore
(Rome
19o0)
fig.
I4.
29
For the entire wall on which the restorationof pl. 27, fig.
29
is
based,
see
my
article
in
AJA
XLIX
(1945)
The Formation
of
a Roman
Style
in
Wall
Painting,
139, fig.
2. Plate
27,
fig.
30
is
taken from
Bossert and
Zschietzschmann,
op.cit.,
pls.
96
and
97. (Reliefs
from
the
Tomb of the
Haterii).
30
Mau,
op.cit., fig. 263.
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1956]
A
ROMAN
SOURCEBOOK
FOR
THE
STAGE
33
more
permanent
form
of scaenae
frons;
during
the
Fourth,
the actual
appearance
of the
imperial
stone
scaena was
also
reflected,
enlivened,
however,
in
the
living
room
by
the
pictorial
contrast of
light
and
shade,
of structure
with an
airy
vista which
had vanished
from
the
stage
but
which
continued
in its
domestic
forms
to
haunt the
imagination
of
later Italian
painters.
WASHINGTON,
D.C.
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LITTLE
PLATE 20
Fig.
I.
Cubiculum in
the
Villa of
Fannius
Synistor
at
Boscoreale
Fig.
2.
Wall
in
oecus
of
the
House
of
the
Labyrinth
Fig.
3.
Double cubiculum
8
in the
Villa
Item
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10/16
PLATE 21 LITTLE
Fig.
4.
The
Comic
Setting
and
its
frame
Fig. 5.
The
Tragic
Setting
and
its
frame
Fig.
6.
The
Painted
Tragic
Setting
Fig.
7.
Stone Scaena
in
Large
Theater at
Pompeii
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11/16
Fig.
8.
Wall in the
Cryptoporticus
Bath
in
Pompeii
Fig.
i
1.
Fourth
Style
wall in
the House
of
Pinorius
Cerialis
in
Pompeii
Fig.
9.
Wall
in
the
Crypto
Fig.
io.
Third
Style
wall
in
the
House
in
Pompeii
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PLATE
23
LITTLE
Fig.
12.
Reconstruction of wall in
the
Cryptoporticus
Bath
in
Pompeii
Fig. 13.
Reconstruction
of wall
in
the
Cryptoporticus
Bath
Fig.
14.
Reconstruction
of wall detail
in
the House of Lucretius
Fronto
Fig. 15.
Reconstruction of
wall in
the House of
the
Ara Massima
in
Pompeii
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13/16
LITTLE
PLATE
24
Fig.
16.
Tragic Setting
on
Ephesus Stage
(Exterior
of
Palace)
Fig. 17.
Facade
of the House of
the Faun at
Pompeii
Fig.
18.
Tragic
Setting
on
Ephesus Stage
(Interior
of
Palace)
Fig.
19.
Thyroma
background
of
Satyr
Play
mosaic
Fig.
20.
Tablinum
vista
in
the
House
of
the
Faun
Fig.
21. Painted
setting
on the
Oropus
Stage
Fig.
22.
Painted
setting
on
the
Eretria
Stage
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14/16
PLATE
25
LITTLE
Fig.
23.
Restoration of
Tragic
Set from Cubiculum
I6
of the
Villa Item
Fig.
24.
Restoration of
Tragic
Set from a Cubiculum
in
the
Labyrinth
House
Fig.
25.
The
Roman
Market
Gate
at
Miletus
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15/16
LITTLE
PLATE
26
Fig.
26. Restoration
of
Tragic
Set from
the
Labyrinth
House
Fig. 27.
Restoration
of
Tragic
Set
from
the Boscoreale
Villa
Fig.
28. The Khazne at Petra
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PLATE
27
LITTLE
Fig.
29.
Restoration of
Tragic
Set from
the
House of
Obellius
Firmus
Fig. 30.
a,b.
Reliefs
showing
Roman
Triumphal
Arches on
the
Monument
of
the
Haterii
Fig. 31.
Outline
Tragic
Set
in
Third
Style
Frieze
in
the
House
of
Spurius
Mesor
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